coming up on our t.v. new leadership at the n.s.a. amid all the mass surveillance scandals we now know who will likely leave the intelligence agency this comes as one u.s. senator is planning to file a class action lawsuit against the n.s.a. more just ahead death row for the boston bomber prosecutors in the case against dzhokhar have decided to seek the death penalty a report on the decision ahead. and fighting in syria has created extremists and not just in syria that's all according to a top u.s. intelligence official more on that and an exclusive look at a syrian city captured by islamists later in the show.

it's thursday january thirtieth eight pm in washington d.c. i'm your i david and you're watching r.t. america. and we begin tonight with the news that the obama administration has decided on the next head of the national security agency the department of defense has announced that navy vice admiral michael rogers will take the place of general keith alexander last year alexander announced he would retire the spring of twenty four and admiral rogers will command both the n.s.a. and cyber command the new pentagon unit that directs the country's offensive cyber operations rodgers is said to have more experience than his predecessor and code breaking and the design of america's new arsenal of cyber weapons however it remains to be seen how he will respond to the civil liberties issues that have been golf the n.s.a. in the past year and we do have a correction to make tonight during our five pm newscast we accidentally showed the wrong photo of michael rogers when reporting on the story we apologize for that

error. and speaking of the n.s.a. tonight's episode of politicking with larry king will cover that and much more tonight's guest is former minnesota governor jesse ventura here's a snippet of what's to come when larry and jesse talk about and as they will civil our edward snowden to me he's a hero larry because he caught our government breaking the law and violating the constitution it took great courage to put himself on the line there's wrongdoing no one to the american people and we have every right to know it we have the right to know what our government violates our constitution and our bill of rights and that's what makes him a hero because of the courage she showed in bring you the if if snowden doesn't do that we're still all under surveillance and it's business as usual can anybody secure and tell me that it's a good idea to have all americans put under surveillance they treat us like we're

all potential terrorists and what we're forgiving larry is the main saying they work for war the bosche. so don't forget to tune in at nine pm for that and much more here on r t america and we're just learning that the national security agency carried out spying operations during the two thousand and nine united nations conference on the climate change in copenhagen this is all according to new documents leaked by former government contractor edward snowden according to the documents published by the huffington post and the danish newspaper information the n.s.a. monitored the communications of other countries ahead of the conference and intended to continue those operations throughout the summit the document does not state how the n.s.a. planned to do so but noted it would collect quote signals intelligence which is information gathered from intercepted communications such as phone calls and e-mails the document reveals that the n.s.a. planned to do this to gain an advantage it says leaders and negotiating teams from

around the world will undoubtedly being gaging and intense last minute policy formulating at the same time they will be holding a side bar discussion with their counterparts details of which are of great interest to our policymakers and while some are concerned about the surveillance the u.s. is conducting a broad others here in washington are focused on the n.s.a.'s surveillance of americans here at home in fact senator rand paul is planning to file a class action lawsuit against the n.s.a. speaking at the state of the net conference in washington d.c. this week senator paul said that the administration's increased transparency is only the first step toward reform take a listen. next step is is it constitutional to collect with a single warrant to horizon can you collect one hundred million people's records my answer is no you cannot and should name the person the fourth amendment says you name the person so what i think and i think it's also good for your business model

if you're out there support going the next step which is really shutting down the collection or fighting in a legal way and going to the supreme court if you can yes so to talk about everything from copenhagen to this forthcoming lawsuit i was joined earlier by wes benedict executive director of the libertarian national committee and matt been there a producer at the majority report i started out by asking wes about senator paul's lawsuit and if it will carry more weight in the court. i think it's too soon to tell that right now court decisions are very unpredictable we've had others on other areas like obamacare where some thought it would be struck down others not it's really hard to say one still lawsuits filed people will start analyzing it and make predictions on the legal outcomes but in the meantime i think it makes it it will have an impact to help bring awareness to the public about these issues i think americas setting a terrible example for the rest of the world spine not only on foreigners but

spying on americans as well we don't want other countries spying on americans here in america we don't think it's right i don't think it's right for the american government to be spying on others and the worst part about it is that businesses are being forbidden from telling the truth to the american people and to the world some of this being loosened up now thanks very much to edward snowden's revelations but you are yahoo facebook these companies you go to tell us we're being spied on if they're being used for that and that i'm going to go to you senator paul as says he wants this lawsuit to replicate the success of the internet campaign for sopa. on line opposition to that piece of effectively killed in congress in two thousand and twelve senator paul says he wants millions of people to sign this law see it do you think he may be able to go beyond just libertarian libertarians and actually gain some support from progressive and liberal. i really do think you can with this

it's something both his father and self have been very good at doing on these certain issues these are the sort of privacy issues. but the thing is with this open issue that makes it different from from this is that simple was sort of it was a campaign done by when there was no sort of leader of this campaign whereas rand paul is putting himself first and foremost in this in this class action lawsuit getting people to sign up on this thing he's put together and i'm not really quite sure what his what his angle is here because because he's a congressperson he didn't you can draft some law or go straight for it with a bill of some sort and try to make a change in everything he did and the law itself but instead he's going this public route and it makes me question whether this is really about the n.s.a. or he's looking at twenty six percent and last senator rand paul says he wants this to go all the way to the supreme court do you think there's

a chance that could. certainly there's a chance but you know if lower courts rule a certain way and then this appealed it could make it to the spring chord. i would like to see it go that high and have the court rule again on these issues but i think what are your other guest said about it turning into a political thing that turns off a large part of the country you know he may be a presidential candidate as a republican that may lose him some pour some support from the left but but we'll see i'm glad you bring this issue up i'd like to see someone a democrat pick up on this issue and make a big deal about it as well to get the whole country behind stopping these certainly are you ready a bipartisan issue so far on that given these new revelations about the n.s.a. spying at the u.n. climate summit in copenhagen what's your sense as to why there is so much interest on the part of the u.s. government to tap the communications of these climate negotiations. well i mean

the u.s. has had a history of spying on all sorts of groups i mean. and our kiss on our visions i mean it's just it's just the the us use the excuse that you know the other countries do this sort of spying where do we really want the united states of america to be on this list with the countries that actually do partake in this sort of spying i don't think so. right and matt last year we learned that the n.s.a. spied also on the g. eight and the g twenty summits and when asked about this a national security council spokeswoman caitlin hayden said in an e-mail to the huffington post that quote the u.s. government has made clear that the united states gathers foreign intelligence of the type gathered by all nations so because it's foreign according to them this is all fair game what do you make of that argument i mean i think it's just an excuse to try to make people here in america sound like oh well it's just some foreign entity being spied on americans on speed being spied on which we know is false it's

basically i think it's just something that said to sort of call the response that's going on over here that was matt bender a producer at the majority report and was benedict the executive director of the libertarian national committee. and the justice department has notified a federal judge that it intends to seek the death penalty for dzhokhar if this will be the case if a jury convicts for last april bomb attacks at the boston marathon the attacks which took place nine months ago left three people dead and two hundred sixty wounded tamela. brotherhood legibly perpetrated the attack was killed in a confrontation with police in the days after the bombing i was joined earlier by artie's marina port ny had to discuss this a little bit more i first asked her how the justice department decided that the death penalty was the appropriate course of action. well u.s. attorney general eric holder says that the nature of the conduct at issue and the

resulting harm from the boston bombings compelled his decision for the us to seek the death penalty in the case against defendant now before making a decision mr holder did take recommendations from his own staff as well as the justice department's capital case review committee and boston's u.s. attorney carmen ortiz since the federal death penalty was reinstated in one nine hundred eighty eight the u.s. u.s. attorney generals have authorized authorized this use for an estimated five hundred defendants but of those only three have been executed including timothy mcveigh who was convicted in the one thousand nine hundred five oklahoma city bombings now. faces thirty counts in connection to the boston bombings including the use of weapons of mass destruction resulting in the death of the bombing. of a public place he is also accused of murdering a massachusetts institute of technology police officers days following the bombing

of the seventeen charges which you've mentioned in your lead against he could receive the death penalty for for them so he has thirty charges against him seventeen of them he could face the death penalty and the twenty year old suspect did plead not guilty on all counts back in july he remains in federal custody and we're talking about the death penalty here very serious issue do you think this is going to spark any controversy amongst americans at all. well i don't know what kind of controversy we will see many did believe that this decision wouldn't come wouldn't come down that attorney general holder would actually decide the opposite way and that's because the u.s. attorney general did disclose several times has disclosed several times that he's personally opposed to the death penalty however he instead chose to seek the death penalty in this case you know some experts believe that the reason he made that

decision is because if he decided against life in prison it could have fueled republican accusations against the administration attorney general for being too soft on terrorism but if we look at a poll published in september by the boston globe it found that only thirty three percent of people in massachusetts actually supported the death penalty for certain i of the majority fifty seven percent favored a life sentence without the possibility of parole so here we have the u.s. attorney general not siding with the majority opinion of the case of actually going for the death penalty it's very interesting so when can we expect all of us to sort of commence one of the trial supposed to begin while boston's u.s. district judge george o'toole has said he wants to get the trial rolling he is the one that actually some imposed today as the deadline for the attorney general to make his decision on the death penalty judge tool has ordered

a conference with the lawyers on feb twelfth so they could all decide a starting date of the trial so we don't know when it will start but by mid february we will have word on when the trial is expected to the highly anticipated case a lot of people will be watching. new york studio thank you. anima zuri man has been executed for the fatal shooting of a jewelry store owner and a nine hundred ninety one robbery the u.s. supreme court had granted a stay late tuesday but on wednesday the high court cleared numerous appeals that in part challenge the drug used in the execution smalls was the sixth person executed in the u.s. since the beginning of the year and the third in missouri since november he was pronounced dead at ten twenty pm last night at a state prison after receiving the drug in question a lethal dose of pain o'barr but all smalls did not make a final statement but he did ask which way he should look from the gurney to see his witnesses and nodded to them before his death meanwhile witnesses to executions

in the state of washington will now be given even more access the new witness protocol is in its final stages of approval it includes witnesses having access to television monitors to show the inmate entering the death chamber and being strapped down as well as the ability to see the insertion of the i.v.'s those had both previously been shielded from the public the changes in response to a two thousand and twelve federal appeals court ruling that said all parts of an execution must be fully open to witnesses that ruling was sparked by a case brought by the a.p. and other news organizations who challenge idaho's policy to shield the insertion of i.v. catheters from public view they argued that it was a first amendment right to witness all aspects of the execution and they also said it would be the only way to determine whether it was being properly carried out however the states argued that the current policy was necessary to protect the anonymity of the execution team. and that syria is becoming

a haven for radical extremists with aspirations to launch terrorist attacks against the u.s. that's exactly what a top intelligence official told congress yesterday here's what the director of national intelligence james clapper told the senate intelligence committee. amanda's concern here for these. extremists who are attracted to. syria engage in combat get training and we're seeing no the appearance of training complexes in syria to train people to go back to their countries and and the course of the conduct more terrorist attacks are. clever says that between seventy five thousand and one hundred ten thousand rebels are battling the government in syria of those twenty six thousand are extremists and he says about seven thousand of them are foreigners from fifty different countries including europe and the middle east u.s.

intelligence officials have expressed worry that a handful of american foreign fighters and hundreds of european militants have already returned to their home countries so might all of this change the u.s. course of action in syria i was going to earlier by ahmed sachs here a middle east analyst with clapper saying syria is becoming a haven for radical extremists from all over the world i asked fati if that is something americans should really be concerned about. absolutely and the american government should be very concerned about what's happening in syria and on the other side this is not a surprise this is standard operating procedures for a cause and its affiliates we have seen it over and over again we have seen it in afghanistan we have seen is in pakistan in the fifth area the federally administered tribal areas we have seen it before in the eighty's in the so then when but less than that when they're an established training camps and we saw within iraq from two thousand and three onwards so it's an ongoing it's part of

their operating procedure the get the foothold on the ground and then these thoughts are developed from there so definitely u.s. intelligence community and security apparatus should be very very concerned and one i had some analysts have said that it's possible opposition militants will tire of battling the government which is showing no signs of collapse and instead take their newly acquired skills back to europe or to the u.s. where acts of terror may be able to grab larger headlines is about actually shifting or their target or expanding their targets abroad. this is definitely a valid scenario that these terrorists are going to be going back to their countries whether they're going to be carrying out operations by themselves or they're going to be training others without the need to leave the country we have heard in europe in many european countries in britain in germany in belgium about

the jihad tourism these people are just average or working and then they take a vacation months or so and then do the flock to syria there have to be more vigilant approach and more careful screening at the countries bordering syria and i'm speaking here about turkey about jordan about iraq about who is coming in and where does he go after that i'm sure that the security apparatus in turkey or jordan for example when he sees this in plucks. young people and the old heading into the same direction to go to a border points crossing to syria this should be a red flag i am surprised that it's not been tackled earlier on that was adamant fact a middle east analyst. and it's now been more than a month since islamist rebels seized the industrial syrian town of adria heavy

fighting left thousands displaced and militants still hold large parts of the city making it impossible to go in and verify the details of any atrocities artie's maria often oceanus became the first foreign journalist to get to the area since the start of the siege and spoke to some of the survivors. address is just a twenty minute drive from damascus but the highway runs through an area firmly under rebel control so instead we take a newly created pass driving through high mountains of sand and piles of old tires the army uses to shield its convoys from attacks its maybe longer but it's a safer route pocket on my part where the first for him to be crude to get this close to our drive after the siege began a month ago it's still not clear exactly what happened in this industrial city last december back then reports emerged of numerous killings and fallen soft arguer was attacked by militants belonging to al-qaeda linked groups and the free syrian army

. they stormed into the city and they kept the civilians in their buildings using them as human shields which made our mission very difficult this is why it takes so long we want to avoid civilian losses how to reported allegations the dozens of civilians had been executed that people were beheaded and burned in over ends and one claimed the doctors and patients were killed in a clinic which travelled to address hoping to verify these reports but there is still no way of getting into the besieged areas of the town to confirm if any of that actually happened we got as close as the army can they're actually to the old town admiral blood and the work is house and complex nearby a drum a lier. both and i'll besieged like a dog whistle another one maybe some bankers here to separate other out by law and out room aliya and to prevent the militants uniting because of. these corridors go

all around the besieged cities with the army watching the area day and night this is one of the checkpoints of the syrian army behind this wall is territory held by militants and the soldiers strategy and mission right now is just to watch this area and to shoot if they see the enemy approaching. and this is actually all they can do an image of ration could threaten the lives of those who remain hostage and was no access inside it's impossible to tell just how many the are but luckily most of the residents managed to escape are drug we need some of them to come to see where they shelter around what used to be a large cement factory in this hotel's me he doesn't go to school anymore and then when this place because terrorist attack the seat and we had to skip they occupied

and we cannot go there their own job blocked. he says his father is a government employee this is why it was dangerous for his family to stay we ask where they live now he has mother appear from the darkness of the room barely ten square meters in the silence and everything what is happening is wrong there was no need for any of this see where we are now to what degree we have reached now it's a question that many here are asking because these children haven't seen their mother for a month already seriously ill she couldn't get her medicine due to the siege with her condition deteriorating she was sent to hospital far from her family when on the floor before you we were living in peace and now where are we i wish peace would come back to all of syria. a month later it's still not clear exactly what happened another drug most of those we talked to here in this camp fled before the militants arrived but occasionally some who didn't escape so quickly and the loner

they were looking for anybody serving in the syrian army and also the virus of the syrian soldiers beheaded at the sewage system. we were in a group of about twenty people they were beating us three at a time and killing us and i saw with my own eyes people stone i still see them in my nightmares. and i fish out of a cut drinking water and they prevented the bakery from working for a sitter and young children were about to die from a local water and they threatened us with machine guns. once an important industrial and peaceful city has become yet another syrian battleground for weary forces with three alone confrontation has left well in excess of one hundred thousand dead and millions displaced and yet it's another place where no side looks able to win and it's the ordinary syrian people left to pay the price. t.

from our draw in syria don't you hate it when someone thinks they're better than you just because they have more money tonight president takes a look at a study which tests people's personalities based upon their wealth check it out. have you ever noticed that rich people can be rude jerks who think their money makes them better than everyone out if so you want to be only one researchers at the university of california and berkeley recently conducted a series of studies to see if rich people in america really are jerky or that people who have less money one of the studies involves having two people play

a game of monopoly one player started out with twice as much money and an extra dice to roll every single time the game was played this way the players recognize that the game was radiant but as the game went on the rich player became more visible noxious the rich person even started talking and moving around louder and even ate more free pretzels than the player who wasn't given the advantages but when questioned about why they want the end of the gain all of the rich players talked about their strategy to use as if there were a novel east hills where the reason for their success is not the fact that they had been given twice as much money or the extra for no reason so overall the rich player in every game became louder took more free stuff and was prideful about advantages that they did nothing to deserve in other words the rich player in every game became more of a jerk the researchers conducted other studies to back their hypothesis to they

gave a variety of purchased the pens ten dollars and told them they could keep it or share part of it with a stranger and those who would salaries of less than twenty five thousand dollars gave forty four percent more. of the stranger than those who made more than one hundred fifty thousand dollars they also studied crosswalk footage and determined that fifty percent of people in the most expensive cars would not stop for pedestrians well those in the cheapest cars every time over and over again the study's lead to the same conclusion that as a person level of wealth increase in their feelings of compassion and empathy go down and their feelings of entitlement deserving of and their ideology of self interest increased so no it's not just new science also agree that the more money a person has the more likely she is to be an inconsiderate brood jerk that whole

notion of rich people in america being generous benefactors who are more than happy to trickle down their wealth to the left fortunate that's about as real as a pile of monopoly money tonight let's talk about that by following me on twitter at the residence. and it's back to school for a teacher's aide in massachusetts after her out of class pursuits got her in a bit of trouble twenty three year old tate lynn pearson was put on paid leave after the school received an anonymous packet of some racy photos the pictures were from her side job as a model they depict the teacher scantily clad or seminude with some pictures showing her embracing other seminude women and since the news broke on january twenty first people rushed to her support arguing that her suspension was not warranted that she did not break any laws and that she should be able to do what

she wants on her own time but alas pearson is back on the job by popular demand and that does it for now for more on the stories we covered go to youtube dot com slash r t america check out our website r t dot com slash usa you can also follow me on twitter at a mirror david for now have a great night. i think. i'm. safe. i've got a quote for you. it's pretty tough. stay with sob story. if

this guy like you would smear that guy instead of working for the people most issues in the mainstream media are working for each other bribe writers didn't find . anything they did rather they were.